GEORGIE PARKER: Greater Western Sydney’s end-of-season scandal needed a quick response

There’s a lot to unpack when it comes to Greater Western Sydney’s end-of-season scandal.

There is the fact that it happened, how it was leaked, the harsh response from the AFL, the two opposing reactions from the public and the deafening silence from so many in the industry and players in the league.

So let’s go from the top and address why the toxic culture in society, but especially men’s sports teams (both local and professional) is so damaging.

Joking about something as serious as sexual assault, slavery, or the mass murder of 2,700 people is neither funny nor harmless.

The normalization of these types of jokes is dangerous, and when it comes from the top down, it creates copycat behavior from those who look up to it.

How do we remove this at a local level, where this kind of sexist and hateful behavior occurs regularly, if those who represent your sport and gender at the highest level are doing the same?

For example, let’s go back to May of this year, where the entire men’s development team at Knox School was kicked out for yelling sexist comments and trying to trip the women’s side while they were running on the field.

Or if you want to be even more young and impressionable, let’s not forget St Kevin’s boys, where dozens of schoolchildren were suspended for singing a sexist and misogynistic song on a packed tram. It’s an “if they can, so can we” situation.

This behavior of GWS players is a bigger and more complex issue than ‘boys being boys’ at a ‘private’ end of season function.

It’s part of a toxic culture that’s not acceptable, at any level, but especially from an AFL player, because whether they like it or not, they have to accept the fact that with the title and platform of being an AFL player the AFL, comes a higher standard of acceptable behavior because, unfortunately, it is an example for the following.

The next part is how it leaked. “It’s a private function, they can do what they want”, can be heard saying on social networks.

To what I say, does it matter how? I don’t care that it didn’t happen the way the news came out.

The fact that young men thought it was okay to joke about sexual assault at the end of the season after standing in a circle, arm-in-arm in the eighth round to take a stand against gender-based violence.

So, if you’re up in arms about this being leaked, please be more up in arms about the content, because I tell you what, this is worse.

Then we turn to both sides of the public reactions. Those who think this is a beating and those who are angry and upset.

I’ve had many conversations with men about this, who often say I’m their point of education or their voice of reason not only about women’s sports or our space in sports, but also about the social change we’re trying to make. , as women. do

Now, a positive sign for me with these conversations was that not one of my friends thought what those players were wearing or doing was even remotely funny.

But when asked about the suspensions, there were mixed responses as to whether it was fair or not.

To be honest, I don’t know what the AFL’s response should have been, or what is fair. But the speed of the AFL’s response has been promising.

Sport is such a huge platform and has the ability to turn the dial, both negatively and positively, so it’s important that they take a stand like they have. Those who think this is a beating, well, I don’t even know where to start with that.

And finally the deafening silence of a majority of men in the industry. Women, as you can see online, are loud and angry as we begin to find our voice in this tough and challenging space. But, right now, we feel alone.

As a woman, this industry is tough. If you know anything about me, you’d know that I’m a big personality and I’m not afraid to speak my mind, but at the same time there are times when you can feel so small and unheard.

It’s an industry where the boys’ club mentality is strong and where your public opinion is so heavily gender-biased that it hurts and it’s tiring.

It’s an industry where you feel like if you make noise about misogyny in the workplace you’re not going to get a job again, because when I did, suddenly they didn’t need me anymore.

This is just the workplace, but on a social level the problem is much worse. Gender-based violence is endemic. If it hasn’t affected you personally as a woman, it has affected someone close to you who has been assaulted or raped.

Toxic masculinity is just that, toxic, and it spreads like cancer and needs to be rooted out.

So, as someone who is very hard on the AFL, I appreciate the league’s quick and tough response, but don’t you wish the problem they had to fix didn’t happen to begin with?